Think ballet is the most genteel of arts? Think again.

Throwing acid in the face of Bolshoi Ballet artistic director Sergei Filin may have been one of the most horrific examples of professional sabotage, but hot-blooded Russian dancers have a history of taking matters into their own hands when they don’t get their way. Broken glass hidden in toe shoes, needles stuck into tutus, dressing room costumes ripped to shreds between acts – ballet legend Alicia Markova experienced it all.

As I wrote in my biography The Making of Markova, “Intrigues, jealousies, death threats – even a proposed duel! This wasn’t ballet, it was a Wagnerian opera, and Markova was cast as the doomed heroine.”

That tale begins in 1938 when England’s most celebrated classical dancer – Alicia Markova – joined the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo. The resident Russian contingent – beautiful young ballerina Tamara Toumanova, egotistical male lead dancer Serge Lifar, and their loyal company seamstresses – was incensed at the British interloper being given star status. Never mind that Markova had begun her career at Sergei Diaghilev’s famed Ballets Russes in 1924.

Though the sabotage began on a small scale – the top of Markova’s tutu went missing just before curtain, her costume was “mistakenly” tailored to Toumanova’s measurements so she had nothing to wear on stage, etc. – it escalated when Serge Lifar “accidentally” dropped Markova during a performance and turned her ankle. Given that it happened after she had received 24 curtain calls and he was booed for not allowing her to take the spotlight alone was likely not a coincidence. Lifar was known for overacting on stage as well as off (see photo below).

Serge Lifar, Giselle 1942

Things really got ugly when the company left Europe for New York where the theatre run was sold out in anticipation of the great Markova dancing Giselle in America for the first time.

Tamara Toumanova

Toumanova thought she should star on opening night. Lifar agreed. And so did Mama and Papa Toumanova – a stage mother for the ages married to an ex-military man – who accompanied their daughter on the trip.

Though impresario Sol Hurok liked a pretty face as much as the next person – and Toumanova was truly lovely (see photo) – she couldn’t hold a candle to Markova when it came to the emotionally complex role of Giselle. Hurok only saw dollar signs, and Markova was the big box office draw.

It was obvious things weren’t going well when Markova witnessed Papa Toumanova – incensed that Tamara wasn’t the company’s star – sucker-punching art director Léonide Massine and knocking him to the ground at rehearsal. Though the ex-military man was promptly banned from the theatre, things only got worse.

A few days later Markova was leaving the theatre when someone pressed a note into her hand and dashed off into the crowd. The note read: “DON’T DANCE TOMORROW NIGHT, OR . . . “

Everyone was in a tizzy; Markova was assigned a bodyguard; Markova wanted to back out; Sol Hurok begged her not to. Opening night finally arrived.

From The Making of Markova:

Taking no chances, Hurok set about securing the theatre, beginning with special identification badges issued to every Metropolitan Opera House employee – the first time that had ever been done. ‘A threat of possible violence caused me to take the precaution to have detectives, disguised as stage-hands standing by,’ Hurok added. ‘I eliminated the trap-door and understage elevator used in this production as Giselle’s grave, and gave instructions to have everything loose on the stage fastened down.’ It was like the first half of an Alfred Hitchcock movie. Bu what would be the denouement? Hurok’s final order caused its own set of problems. Already shaken by the sight of security guards in the wings watching her every move – not to mention making her American premiere! – Markova found herself equally agitated while on stage. As she tells the story:

In Act II, Giselle has to pick two flowers from the ground row at the back of the stage during the pas de deux and toss them to Albrecht. It is beautifully timed musically: Giselle has to do a glissade, a temps levé and a run, plucking one lily and then the next. As I performed the step, I found the lilies had been nailed to the ground: battened down like everything else for security. They seemed immovable. The company later told me they had never seen anything like the way the ethereal spirit of Giselle gave one wrench and then another wrench, and tore the lilies from the ground with superhuman – perhaps supernatural – strength – and got back to centre stage in time to carry on. I sometimes wonder why I never developed an ulcer!

Markova, Act II Giselle

The above photo of Markova gracefully holding the lilies as Giselle will give you an idea of the ridiculousness of the above scene. Despite all the melodrama before and after her first American opening night, Markova brought the house down, with critics describing her in the press as “breathtaking,” “phenomenal” and “incomparable.”

Toumanova and Lifar were incensed.

At the next night’s performance of Giselle, Lifar seemed to lose his balance when lifting Markova, dropping her down so hard she fractured her foot. It was another “accident” of course. Next came the challenge to a duel in Central Park – but that’s a story for another day.

The life of Alicia Markova (1910 – 2004) is as improbable as it is remarkable. When she came of age, prima ballerinas were Russian, robust, classically beautiful, and Christian. Markova was British, fragile, ethnic looking, and Jewish. A painfully shy and frail little girl, Lilian Alicia Marks (Sergei Diaghilev renamed her Markova) also suffered from leg and foot deformities, a riches-to-rags upbringing, and a frighteningly overbearing governess who locked her in her room for “safekeeping.”

Defying all odds – and with a great deal of fortitude and reinvention – she grew up to become not only the most acclaimed classical prima ballerina of her generation, but also a worldwide celebrity and impassioned ambassador for the art of ballet. It was quite a perilous and bumpy road to success, with The Making of Markova reading more like a novel than a biography.

In the many years I’ve been working on the book, my friends have been riveted by Markova’s almost unbelievable life stories, and invariably ask if there’s video of her dancing that they can look at today. While there are snippets on You Tube, as well as existing BBC broadcasts, none really capture the ethereal poetry, gossamer fragility, and gravity-defying leaps that so mesmerized audiences and critics in her day.

But someone who did capture the essence of Markova’s magnetism – and her decidedly modern sensibility – was legendary photographer Maurice Seymour, or rather photographers Maurice Seymour, plural. Maurice and his brother Seymour Zeldman emigrated from Russia as teenagers and settled in Chicago, Illinois. As told to me by Maurice’s son Ron Seymour (currently a talented Chicago-based photographer himself), the brothers opened their studio under the name “Maurice Seymour,” a combination of their first names. But when vendors didn’t understand why Maurice Zeldman (1900 – 1993) was signing their paychecks, Ron’s father legally changed his name to Maurice Seymour. His brother eventually also took the same last name, and odd as it may seem, became Seymour Seymour.

But there was one more twist. When the brothers separated their businesses later in their careers – Maurice staying in Chicago and Seymour moving to New York – Seymour legally changed his name once again – to Maurice Seymour!

No matter who snapped the actual photo, the Maurice Seymour name guaranteed an arresting, often iconic image, and the brothers became world-renowned for their theatrical and portrait photography. Just look at the effortlessly elegant photo of Markova in Swan Lake at the top of this website, or the powerful image of her in Rouge et Noir, at right. (For more Maurice Seymour images, visit Ron’s website at ronseymour.com)

As the brothers were immensely talented – and spoke Russian – they became the undisputed photographers of choice when the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo came to Chicago on one of their cross-country tours. (Many of the dancers were only fluent in Russian and spoke very little English. The British-born Markova was one of the exceptions.) Extra time was allotted in Chicago for photo sessions at the Seymour studio, where many of the leading dancers were immortalized in their most famous roles.

Maurice’s son Ron had a ringside seat when he was a young child in the 1940s. Here he shares some memories of watching his father and uncle work in their studio with all those celebrated dancers:

Ron Seymour:
“Often the whole Company would come for an entire weekend. It was like a huge party – although my father and uncle were of course working. There was food, champagne, music and everybody was having a good time. There were make-up people, costume people. It was quite chaotic, but also very productive.

“There was a big dressing room, a big reception area, and the studio itself, which was large. Dancers were in various states of undress, just like backstage at the ballet.

“They had a stage set up in the studio, about 14 inches high off the floor. Behind the stage there was a bank of lights, which would shine up in the background. There was no strobe lighting with automatic flash back then. They used very strong lighting, spotlights – not soft floodlights.” (That’s how the brothers achieved their signature bold theatrical style.)

Ron also told me a little-known secret. For dancers who had difficulty holding a particular pose – Markova was famous for being able to stand on one toe seemingly forever (see above photo of her in a costume for The Nutcracker) – there was a barre built across the stage. “A ballerina could actually be gently leaning against it for a photograph, and then it could be retouched out of the picture afterward,” Ron explained.

Though many “Maurice Seymour” negatives would be lost in the 1970s – a fascinating story for a later post – Ron happily was able to safeguard some of the most spectacular ballet photos of the 1930s, ‘40s and beyond.